Saint Etienne

Welcome to the latest edition of Pitchfork's Guest List. Each week, we ask one of our favorite artists to fill us in on what they've been up to lately: which tracks they can't stop spinning, what books they can't put down, and what new bands they've caught on tour. This week it's Bob Stanley of Saint Etienne, who has been researching pop music's history, filming a documentary on the newly refurbished Royal Festival Hall, and staying up past his bedtime to watch the U.S. Open.
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Favorite New Songs from the Past Year __

Ladyhawke, "Paris Is Burning".

Sebastian Tellier's new album [ * Sexuality * ].

Alphabeat, "Fascination" is one of my favorite pop singles.

MGMT, "Electric Feel": It's sort of obvious, but it's a great single.

This a pretty good time, I think, for new electronic pop. The only problem, and it's been my problem with it for a few years now, is that's it's not actually, really, genuinely new. It's very hard to imagine what music would sound like in the future. Maybe it's just being a certain age, but you always assumed that music was going to take bounds forward and sound "futuristic" in the future. And I think the point at which I realized that it probably wasn't going to happen was when Westlife had the first UK no. 1 of the new century, "Seasons in the Sun". In 1974, if I was trying to measure what music sounds like in the year 2000, it wouldn't have been "Seasons in the Sun".

__ >> Favorite Older Songs at the Moment __

I've been listening to lots of pre-rock, 1950s stuff-- Frankie Lane and Jo Stafford-- which I'm sure nobody else in the world is remotely interested in [ * laughs * ]. I've sort of become obsessed with the era immediately before rock'n'roll. I'm starting to write a book about... well, loosely about pop history, so I thought, "I need to start there." Otherwise you end up going back to the 1800s or something. So I've become obsessed with this period when vinyl had just been invented, and then you got the first charts as well, which is basically... the two things are associated: the foundations for modern pop music.

I normally like the Monkees in the summer, but we've had this miserable summer. I don't think I've played the Monkees once [ * laughs * ]. Oh, Jimmy Campbell, the guy who did the 23rd Turnoff... he was in various Liverpool bands in the 60s and 70s and never really cracked it, but there's a bunch of his reissues coming out. He's got a very melancholic, kind of baroque songwriting style which I really like.

And the Gary Walker and the Rain album, which is the Walker Brothers' drummer's one and only album, which is about to reissue [ * Album No. 1 * ]. That's phenomenal. Kind of psychedelic pop I suppose. It sort of sounds like * Revolver * , two years later and slightly heavier. It's a fantastic record.

__ >> Favorite New Band __

I don't even know. I just listen to random things. I saw Sebastian Tellier playing together with Lykke Li, which was great. I saw Alphabeat right in the beginning of the year in a pub, which was quite handy-- there were, like, 30 people there [ * laughs * ].

I really can't think. It's terrible. I nearly always have a favorite band at any given point, but I just can't think of any at the moment. [ * pause * ] Girls Aloud maybe? I thought their last album was absolutely great from beginning to end. A mix of sort of dodgy cover versions and ballads. Anything on that could have been a hit.

__ >> Favorite Song of All Time __

"Wichita Lineman" by Glen Campbell. It's got everything in it: mysterious lyrics, deeply romantic, incredible arrangement... and instrumentation where you can't actually work out what it is, which is always great. You get that on a lot of Beach Boys records as well, where you have no clue, even 40 years later, what is actually making the sound you're listening to. Which is probably as close as you get to when you're a kid, and you first hear "Heart of Glass" or "I Want to Hold Your Hand", and you just hear this amazing noise, you don't even know that it's musical instruments doing it.

__ >> Last Great Concert __

I went to see a new band at the Nottingham Arts Club called Vagabonds, who were quite good. They're kind of... how to describe them? Sort of like a balearic Charles and Eddie.

__ >> Last Great Film I Saw __

I went to see * Wall-E * , which is slightly embarrassing [ * laughs * ]. It was great. I've sort of been more into DVD box sets this year, so I've worked my way through "Mad Men", and I've just started on "The Wire". "Mad Men" is phenomenal, and again it's sort of fed my obsession with the 1950s for the moment [ * laughs * ].

What else have I seen at the cinema? * Happy-Go-Lucky * , which I thought was a stinker. Wouldn't recommend that. I couldn't believe-- about three-quarters of the way through, I thought, "Oh right, so this actually is the main thread of the film!" I thought it was some minor side story: She's having an argument with her driving instructor. But it's the bulk of the story! It's been a pretty slow year here. Even when you look at recommended films, it's the same ones week after week.

I watched "Freaks and Geeks", which I don't really think got shown here at the time. Got me into * Knocked Up * and * The 40 Year-Old Virgin * , that Judd Apatow stuff, which I really like.

__ >> Last Great Book I Read __

I read * 2stoned * , the second Andrew Loog Oldham book, which is great, and for some reason I hadn't read it. I read * Stoned * years ago and thought, "Oh, I don't really care about them"-- the period when the Stones were famous. I just wanted to know about the period leading up to him actually meeting them. It's, well, pretty inspirational, really. You know, his life was completely off the rails.

Oh! I just finished reading a book... * What Was Lost * , by Catherine O'Flynn. It's about a girl who disappears in the early 80s. The rest of it is set in a shopping center, in modern day Birmingham. It's very melancholy, but it's very beautifully written. It's her first book. Won a few awards over here.

I just started reading a book about the Spanish Civil War called * The Time of the Doves * [or * La Plaza del Diamante * , by Merce Rodoreda], which is quite prose-y. I've literally just started it, but it seems pretty good.

__ >> Favorite Piece of Musical Equipment __

The Wasp, which is a yellow and black 70s keyboard. It's very flimsy and plastic and makes this very nasty, wasp-like noise. It's my favorite for playing, because it's impossible not to get a good noise out of it. Sound-wise, though, I'd probably go with the harpsichord. I can't play harpsichord.

__ >> Favorite Record Shop __

It used to be Beanos in Croydon, but it closed down. It was, like, the biggest second-hand shop in the country, so it sort of explains why I've grown up the way I have, really. I had a job about three doors along from it as well, so I'd finish the job and go straight to the shop and spend all my money [ * laughs * ]. But now, my favorite local shop is a second-hand shop called __ Alan's Records __ in East Finchley, North London, which just gets stuff in and sells it cheap. It's just like rummaging through a superior junk shop, really. Pretty much what I like spending most of my spare time doing [ * laughs * ].

I was in there last week, trying to think of what I found... I got a lovely copy of a Supremes album called * Meet the Supremes * ... got a Jerry Mulligan album called * Night Lights * , which is great. Makes me feel old, 'cause it's proper dinner party music. And a single by a bloke, Phil Cordell, called "London Dairy", which is very... densely produced. I guess he's influenced by Joe Meek, but from, like, the early 70s. Sounds sort of like Badfinger produced by Joe Meek.

__ >> Best Purchase of the Past Year __

I got a run of * Crawdaddy * magazines a few months ago. I just bought a David Essex concert poster. Probably nothing new.

I need to get myself a new iPod, because I got one for my 40th birthday from [bandmates] Pete [Wiggs] and Sarah [Cracknell]. It still works, but the battery lasts for about 10 minutes. That's what I should buy myself.

__ >> Best Thing I Did This Year __

I went to Savannah, Georgia, in January. It was amazing.

__ Pitchfork: __ It's a beautiful town. *

Yeah, it really is. I don't know of anywhere else that's like that. It was pretty amazing. Swam with manatees on holiday, that was great. That seems pretty hard to beat. I'm going to go on holiday to a small island near Ibiza in the beginning of October. I don't think anyone goes clubbing down there, just cycling. It's all wooded and just amazing.

__ >> Favorite Venue __

Probably the Royal Festival Hall, which we made a film about last year, so... I'd say I'm a bit sick of the sight of it now, but beforehand it was my favorite, anyway. Sort of early-50s, modern, proper concert hall. They actually changed the acoustics-- they redesigned it while we were filming. Sort of gutted the whole thing and rebuilt it again. But I always thought the acoustics were great in there, really bass heavy. We played there with Broadcast in 2002, which was great. It's just breathtaking, if you're onstage or if you're watching, it's beautiful.

__ >> Favorite TV Show at the Moment __

I just started watching "The Wire", and I'm only, like, seven episodes into the first season, so I've got a long way to go. I'm not normally that big on detective shows, but it's just so well done. I've been watching it with subtitles-- that was a tip that someone gave me, because some of the dialogue is impossible to understand otherwise!

__ >> Favorite Video Game at the Moment __

I never [play video games]... I'm slightly too old. if I was a bit younger it might have been more central in my life. But I'm really into sports. I must have stayed up 'til god knows what hour to watch the womens' singles final in the U.S. Open the other night. Started at 2:30 in the morning over here. I watched the first set and was like, "This is only gonna go one way, don't know why I'm bothering." [ * laughs * ] I got really tired.

__ >> Favorite Radio Show __

Saturday morning over here is "Sounds of the 60s", which Brian Matthew presents-- he did "Saturday Club" in the 60s-- he must be in his mid-eighties now, he's a bit ancient. It's exactly like listening to someone who woke up with these things 45 years later.

And then after that it's Jonathan Ross' program, who is just... I don't know, he gets paid some stupid amount, like 15 million a year by the BBC [ * £18 million --Ed. * ]. But he is actually genuinely very funny, so I don't quite mind [ * laughs * ].

And then Radio 5 over here for football on Saturday afternoon. 'Cause that's what I do with my Saturdays, listen to the radio.

__ >> My Ringtone __

[ * laughs * ] God, I don't know the name. It's just a standard ringtone [ * laughs * ]. I was thinking, if you put something on that's one of your favorite bits of music, it's absolutely going to kill it for you. I would never ever do that [ * laughs * ]. I've got a friend who has the "Persuaders Theme", by John Barry. Every time his phone rings, when I'm out for coffee with him, it's like, "Shit, don't want to hear that." I wish I knew what mine was called, but I don't. You'd recognize it if you heard it. Your standard Orange ringtone.